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Trials of Mana


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I'm glad this is (reportedly) a short RPG. Not that I'm not enjoying it, but it's incredibly simplistic. Everything is telegraphed to keep u on the right path; every time u get to a new town there's one, just one, upgraded weapon waiting for u in the shop, same with armour. The enemies are perfectly scaled for, and u never take a wrong turn and find some beast far out of your compass (who u can get your revenge on later).

 

And I'm going to have to read up on the upgrade wheel, where u spend experience points. It seems simple enough. You have many things to upgrade in the usual strength, intelligence etc paths, but then you seem to have to assign these various upgrades to your character, and u only get a couple of slots, rendering most of your upgrades meaningless.

 

I'm pretty sure I'm not quite understanding it tho. It can't be as I've described. There must be something I'm missing.

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I think I understand the upgrade system now. I think u build a job for each character using the upgrades you've unlocked. 4 slots have been unavailable since the start because the game states these are 'tied to class.' I'm assuming that this means job, and at some point in the game u get to choose one. That would be nice because I haven't got a white mage yet, even tho the description in the character select wheel definitely suggested that the green suited Reize, from an Amazonian sisterhood had support magic.

 

Still, the game has opened up somewhat, and there's certainly a point to exploring the nooks and crannies of towns, dungeons and the unexpectedly large overworld. You can even find actual upgrades that you didn't have to fight and earn points for.

 

I'm such a sucker for these games tho, it's hard to be objective. Give me a couple of hours and I start to fall in love with the dumb characters and the stupid things they say, with the cute towns and silly inhabitants.

 

And this is another good one. I'm starting to actually worry about these nutters.

 

Of course I'm not expecting another masterpiece like X-2 **

 

 

 

 

 

 

**runs

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This is a strange game in certain ways. Coming to it cold there are things that the game hides from u which can be annoying when the cold light of realisation smacks u around the chops.

 

For example, I have no healer in my team, and will have to use items for the duration of the game, despite the character select screen describing one of my characters as having support magic. With a little googling at my continuing lack of options in this area it turns out that only one of the 6 available characters has healing magic from the start, and another 2 can get it much later on. Needless to say I selected none of these characters, and the game hides so much from you at the start that you can have absolutely no idea things are going to pan out this way.

 

Not that it's much if a problem just yet. The game is only challenging when a boss rears his ugly noggin, and the items are far more potent and plentiful than in an FF game - for example the game's phoenix down restores a character with full health.

 

This being said, the game is highly enjoyable in presentation, with some standout moments in the combat, and bosses that would fail to raise a smile only in the soulless. And with your 3 characters interchangeable at the flick of a switch you can pull off some interesting strategy moves in the toughest battles.

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I'm around six hours in. It's good fun but also incredibly shallow so far – in every possible way from gameplay to story. I hope I unlock these "classes" soon because I've been holding back on spending Talent Points for two hours now because I fear I might be wasting them. There's a reset option, thankfully, but I'd rather save that money. Another thing I don't really like is how the only things you find in chests around the world are consumable items. There's just very little in terms of equipment going on and I think that's a bit of a shame.

 

I guess I just need to start reminding myself that it's a SNES game. I enjoy it but there are some JRPG systems and tropes I expected from it despite those only coming into existence during the PS1/PS2 era. 

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I have to take back some of my criticism. I found a piece of armour today. One. After almost 8 hours of playtime. Everything's fine now.

 

All joke's aside I also unlocked my first new classes and boy was it time for that. The two hours or so before that point were incredibly dull. There was nothing worthwhile to spend my Talent Points on and my characters didn't learn any new skills and stuff. But now I finally have the option to sort of specialise them in some aspects. Reisz is primarily an attacker with some support spells after deciding to ditch the cleavage in favour of proper armour, Angela is the classic Mage (whose MP pool is way too low) and Duran is developing into some sort of tank even though he always dies first for some reason. Maybe I should take that Provoke skill off of him until he has better defense. Anyway, there's a bit more to do now and the game is all the better for it. It's still not a modern RPG but a lot better than during the initial 5/6 hours.

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I have Angela as a black mage, too. I've got an MP boost on her and I find, if you really want to go to town with her, a couple of walnuts will get her thru most dungeons, and then a couple for the bosses.

But she's got spells that can absolutely devastate a lot of field enemies while the rest are putting their backs out in attack. And I love the way the relevant little sprite pops out of her when she casts.

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Yeah, as soon as you have some more Element Spirits in your party the magic attacks can be devastating.

 

One thing that's slightly bothering me is that the class switch options get unlocked way too late. Instead of level 18/38 it should have been 10/30. I'm now at 33 and yet again I find myself hoarding Talent Points because there's nothing worthwhile to unlock anymore and I'm also getting slightly tired of seeing the same Special Moves over and over again. More than anything else this is a pacing issue in a game that doesn't really bother trying to make you stop and do something else than just the main story, so it's weird to see them block your access to the class upgrades for so long.

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Actually I reached the required level and was all excited when I grabbed the last elemental and went to try to upgrade classes.

 

Feckin game still won't let me. Says I need a class item or some such thing. I have no idea what that is and can't remember it even being mentioned in the game. I'm not quite ready to Google it yet as enemies aren't giving much trouble at the mo. 

 

If you have any idea what's happening here @Maryokutai, feel free. 

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Well, the game told me I need some ???-Seeds because those turn into the necessary class items (probably randomised, ugh). What I don't know is if I'll just randomly get those by continuing the story or if I have to go to certain (optional?) areas.

 

I might just make a new save and go for the story thing and see if something happens. My team is at 40 now and I haven't used a single Talent Point since level 35 or something. 

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Ok, I found out how it works. The good news is that you only need to continue playing to unlock whatever's necessary. The bad news is that it might turn out to be quite the grind. Because the way it works is that one Seed unlocks exactly one class (either Light or Dark) and they're randomised. So it's basically down to luck whether you get what you need and since you hae to plant the seeds before you know what's in them you can never be sure if you have enough or not while you're in an area. 

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I reached that part where the game tells you about ???seeds, but I still haven't got one even after grinding that area 3 times. I'm now level 43!

 

Stoopid game. 

 

Reminds me if when you get blocked on the sphere grid in FFX for want of a level 3 sphere.

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I don't think you can get them in that area yet. I found my first one in a chest while revisiting the desert/fire dungeon for story purposes. You might want to wait with the grind until the big backtracking starts (trying to avoid spoilers here).

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Jesus Mana Christ, I finally managed to switch classes. At level 50! Here's how the cuties and the haircut-hating freak look now:

 

Spoiler

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I actually had my first Game Over earlier which I presume is because I was running around with Level 2 classes and also because those teammate are so, so stupid. My god. Don't stand still on the red circles you idiots.

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Nice one. I haven't been able play today and will be pushed for a session until the weekend. (Missus Bellow has started to regard the lockdown as some sort of house fixing mission). I stopped last night with the sword of mana (I think) right in front of my team.

 

I suffered a wipe with that evil fireplace boss earlier on in the game. How many attacks can one boss have? I then realized he had a weak point - the area right in front of his stupid face!

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Actually managed a session. I now have 3 benevodons under my belt. They are immense bosses, aren't they? Difficult but in the right way, although I suffered a bit with the fiery one because my team couldn't dodge his attacks, and then u whittle down your  9 phoenix downs (or whatever) until there's nothing left because of foolish AI.

 

Still haven't managed to upgrade my classes, though. I haven't had a single drop, although I've got 3 from chests. Stupid friggin system, this ?

 

 

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What do you mean you haven't had aa single drop? Every ??? Seed is a guaranteed class item. Or did you get the wrong one?

 

The fire boss is pretty bad because of the AI. Another one in the woods has the same problem. The companions are just too stupid which feels like it's their way of balancing the game out. Because the character I'm playing myself usually doesn't take that much damage at all.

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No, I mean I've read that enemies in the benevodon dundeons drop them. I haven't got around to planting the 3 I have yet, from the chests - but I've heard it's pot luck in terms of what u get.

 

I was thinking of just manipulating the save point next to the planter in the sword of mana area until I get the class items I want. A bit of a cheat, I know, but the game is being an unconscionable tease in this area. 

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I'd just play normally until you get them to be honest. I think I only had to collect five Seeds to get the three I needed and the game doesn't really drop duplicates until you got all of them at least once (at least it feels that way). Just make sure you don't spend your Talent Points right now, there's quite a bunch of stuff unlocking at Class 3.

 

Also, I made this today:

 

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Wasn't really worth it but considering it's not particularly time consuming I decided to 100% an RPG at least once in my life.

 

 

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